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Faculty Members Do Not Speak For Law StudentsBy Ryan Cheshire The Forum - 04/08/2002

It is the feeling of many students at the University of North Dakota School
of Law that The Forumís article of April 3, entitled ďUND law school opposes
monikerĒ either deliberately or recklessly portrayed the Law Schoolís opinion on
the Sioux name. It should be stated that the only persons who voted for the
resolution discussed in The Forumís article were the following tenured and
tenure-track professors:

As The Forum stated in its article there are about 200 students at the UND
Law School. However, those 200 did not necessarily support the resolution. The
student body and staff at the school were purposely left out of the resolution
vote. While some of the students may support the name change, many do not. Even
those students that do support the change did not have a vote to back the
resolution.

To state that the UND Law School supports that change because seven tenured
and tenure-track professors felt this way, is unarguably inaccurate. The public,
our state representatives, the Board of Higher Education, and alumni donating to
the law school, should be aware that on a daily basis many of UNDís faculty
spend much of their time and resources at the law school devoted solely to this
issue. Some faculty members have even canceled class to attend conferences and
lectures on the topic of the nickname while on the other hand, have refused to
cancel in such instances as when the Supreme Court of North Dakota visits our
school.

It should be clearly stated that the University of North Dakota School of Law
provides a great educational experience. This comment in no way is meant to
represent that the majority of students either support or oppose the name
change.

The faculty clearly supports the premise, as Leigh Jeanotte stated, that: ďas
there is greater awareness and more education, I think youíll see more and more
opposition come forward.Ē To put it simply, Jeanotte, as well as many of the
faculty, seem to support the notion that if you believe the name is not
offensive, it must be because you are ignorant. The student representatives to
the faculty committee intentionally requested that the tenured and tenure-track
faculty not portray the resolution as a school backed initiative. It seems,
however, that The Forumís article, along with the tenured and tenure-track
faculty members have succeeded to do just that.

The undersigned students of the University of North Dakota School of Law: